


When You Were Young

by Funkspiel



Series: Fantastic Beasts Kink Meme Fills [2]
Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Body Modification, Child Abuse, Fantastic Beasts Kink Meme, Gen, Graves is smol and must be protected, I can't believe I'm writing another de-aging fic, Manipulation, Mental Regression, Niffler and Graves gonna be BROS THO, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Potions, Sickfic, Smol Graves catches a cold, i'm literal trash
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2018-09-11 23:40:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9043337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Funkspiel/pseuds/Funkspiel
Summary: Fantastic Beasts Kink Meme Fill:After Graves makes one too many near-successful escape attempts, Grindelwald decides that it's too much trouble to try and imprison Graves as a full-grown, powerful wizard. So he reduces Graves to the body and mentality of a toddler.





	1. Young Again

It had taken days, this go around. In the beginning, Graves had been strong – tired from his abuses, but still strong. His attempts had been clever and headstrong and quite nearly successful on a number of occasions. But Grindelwald had assumed the man would tire, with time. From starvation, dehydration, torture, or sheer loss of hope; any of those reasons and more. But as Grindelwald walked into Graves’ flat that night after a long day of impersonating the man for his own ends, he quite nearly felt his patience snap at seeing the door to the man’s prison hanging open.

He had charmed the closet into becoming a makeshift prison for the Director. A small, windowless room filled with a cold cobblestone floor and wet, weeping walls. But as he approached it, he found the chains within it loose and empty – their locks scratched up and somewhat bloody. Quietly, he closed the door and followed the trail of grime that Graves no doubt unintentionally left upon his own carpet down the hall and around the corner to the man’s own bedroom.

The door was closed, a light sheen of magic glimmering weakly upon it.

“My patience is wearing thin, Mr. Graves,” Grindelwald sneered, first in Graves own voice – but slowly it melted away as the man’s transfiguration spell ebbed into nothingness. With a shaking hand, Grindelwald first composed his hair before flicking his wand at the door and shattering the thin shield Graves had managed – despite his captivity – to set upon it.

In his rage, the door burst into splinters, causing the man on the other side of the bed to flinch in surprise. But Graves, to his credit, did not let that surprise keep him down for long. Kneeling low and with one hand still addressed to the window – fingers fluttering as he worked at the many wards and charms Grindelwald had set upon it to keep Graves in – the captive Director of Magical Security turned his other hand to his captor and managed to hit him with a wall of kinetic energy that forced the dark wizard back a few feet.

Grindelwald was too surprised to see that Graves still had the strength to cast wandless magic, let alone hold up a shield whilst simultaneously pulling down his own, to block the attack. It was weak, however – Graves' magic pulled between three targets as it was. It managed to throw him only halfway down the hallway. But that was enough to enrage him.

Grindelwald rushed back to the room, coat sweeping as he deflected two more blasts of force from the man before he was finally upon him. There was a moment where a defined shuddering began to wrack the Director’s form, visible even beneath the scant clothing he still had left to him; a sight that made Grindelwald smile cruelly. Graves, however, did not stop trying to take down Grindelwald’s carefully placed wards even as he stared the man in the eye. As if he was only mere seconds from freedom.

“ _Crucio,”_ Grindelwald sneered in a quiet, snarling whisper, and suddenly all magic from Graves disappeared – lost beneath the red, lancing anguish of the Cruciatus Curse. Graves bit his lip to keep from screaming, but as always, that effort did not last past fifteen seconds. Grindelwald could not help but hate the man more for not having given up that simple, useless effort by now. The dear Director just would not break.

After thirty seconds, Grindelwald released his hold on the man and greatly relished the way Graves bonelessly melted into the floor – exhausted. There were dark circles that rimmed the undersides of the man’s eyes, and a gauntness to him that made Grindelwald satisfied in his work. But the dark trail of red that was currently oozing from the man’s nose was of no doing of Grindelwald’s he knew. It was from the stress of using so much magic while under such physical duress. Another symbol of the man’s strength and the lengths he was willing to go to for his freedom.

Kneeling, Grindelwald swiped the blood away from the shuddering man’s upper lip with a cruel jab before holding it up to the light – inspecting it as if it were some rare, new discovery.

“You’re not going to give up, are you, Mr. Graves?” Grindelwald said, tiredly, as though suddenly exhausted from their spat. His eyes fell slowly down to his captive who, despite his ordeal, was glaring up at him; his dark eyes fiery.

“No,” Graves said between deep, heaving breaths. “I will not.”

Grindelwald nodded, his eyes trained on his captive as he considered him. “How did you pick the locks?”

Graves glared at him and clenched his jaw. Grindelwald sighed and fought against the mounting anger this man so quickly could ignite.

“ _Imperio_.”

Graves shuddered and threw back his head – his jaw a painful, clenched thing – then finally spat, “I broke the stone floor and ground down a shard to a fine point. I used that to pick the lock.”

Which explained the blood and the scratches; but not how he was able to break _stone_ while bound both physically and magically.

“How did you use your magic?”

Graves glared at him again, tears welling in his eyes not from his abuses, but from the burn it no doubt caused to resist the Imperius Curse for as long as he was. Perhaps from anger. Or freedom lost.

“I flooded the manacles until they couldn’t contain anymore. I didn't have much time, but enough to shatter the stone before the cuffs could catch up.”

Grindelwald growled and stood suddenly, making Graves flinch despite himself. It was a small thing that gave Grindelwald joy, but not enough to quail his rage. It burned to know that there was a wizard that could not even just outsmart his wards – but could put out as much magic while under extreme physical duress as some wizards could at the top of their game. This man had not become Director for no reason, Grindelwald knew. And he had been grateful the man was as accomplished in such a rare trait as wandless magic that he himself could continue to use it freely as he impersonated the man. But now he was realizing that Graves was no mere tool of a wizard with which he could hide away. He was quite nearly an _equal_.

To have flooded magic binding manacles; to have broken all six of the seals Grindelwald had placed upon the closet door; to have pulled himself to the bedroom and identified the weakest point in the flat for Grindelwald’s wards; and to have then placed a shield, however thin, upon the bedroom while then pulling apart the last walls between himself and freedom all while wandless – Graves was a wizard to be reckoned with.

And obviously, one Grindelwald could no longer afford to underestimate.

“It seems, my good man, that we have a problem,” Grindelwald said, looming over the broken and exhausted form of one Percival Graves. “You appear to have an excess of magical energy that, as much as it pains me to admit, I can’t quite keep up with.”

Graves raised his chin, as though realizing something, and growled. “Finally going to kill me, then?”

Grindelwald took his time in letting Graves stew in his question before shaking his head.

“No. I don’t believe in wasting a perfectly good pawn, not while you could still be useful,” Grindelwald said, then flicked his wand once more – forcing Graves to rise to his feet against his will. While the Imperius Curse could control Graves’ will, it did not change the fact that the man was beaten and exhausted. Grindelwald could not help but smile cruelly as Graves rose to his feet only to stumble into the bed, weak from his escape attempt. It did his heart good to see the man suffer.

He left him there for a good moment, struggling to keep standing, as Grindelwald checked the damage the Director had managed to inflict upon his wards. It came as a surprise, however, when he realized that most of them were still standing. He found it hard to believe, however, that he had managed to catch Graves early in his attempt. And then he realized which strand of his wards Graves had been targeting – that he had been mere minutes away from unraveling, had Grindelwald not found him. His strongest strand; the one that prevented Graves from apparating or disapparating out of the flat.

“You would have splinched yourself,” Grindelwald said, turning his fury into insults.

Graves shot him a dark look.

“I had to try.”

It had been clever, focusing only on one rather than trying to undo them all. To identify and target the specific ward would have been taxing. The fact that the man’s nose was only bleeding and he wasn’t in fact quite simply unconscious was a feat in and of itself. Not for the first time, Grindelwald hated the fact that this talented wizard would not see reason. That he would not defect. That society had so clearly brainwashed him into using his gifts to suppress his people rather than help lead Grindelwald’s charge to freedom.

It was tragic, really.

And more than that, Grindelwald could not help but hate the man – knowing now that he might have succeeded in capturing the Director only because he had managed to surprise him all those weeks ago.

“Follow me,” Grindelwald demanded coldly, and walked briskly to the kitchen; enjoying the soft, muted groaning that came from Graves as he was forced by the curse to drag himself along behind him. If not for the narrowness of his hallways and the support of the walls, Graves likely would not have made it.

“Sit,” he said when Graves finally made it to the kitchen, conjuring a stool from nothing. The man wobbled without the support of a backrest. Grindelwald loved it.

“What are you doing?” Graves asked.

“Finally taking you seriously, it would seem,” Grindelwald answered as he opened Graves’ fridge to reveal a scant amount of food, but more specifically, a somewhat large and menacing looking bottle filled with a glowing silver drought. He plucked it from the fridge and set it on the counter between them before summoning his own stool and sitting down opposite of Graves; all the while looking like the cat that caught the canary.

“I do think I found just the thing for you, my dear Director,” he said, gesturing to the silver potion that had caught Graves’ attention. It was obvious by his puzzled, untrusting face that he did not recognize the drought. Good.

If Graves had such an abundance of magical prowess, then Grindelwald would just have to take it away. Then, he would finally have peace in his own damn home. Well, his _stolen_ home. Semantics.

“Drink it.”

Graves’ back stiffened suddenly as though his spine had become as straight and solid as a lightning rod, his shoulders tense and shaking as he tried to resist the compulsion. A bead of sweat appeared at his temple, his oily hair trembling from the quaking of his rakish form. He forced his hands to clutch the seat of his stool and willed himself to stay. Grindelwald would admire his strength if not for the fact that Graves so openly opposed him all the fucking time.

“ _Drink. It.”_

Graves finally cried out, eyes clenched shut as he fought it. His cheeks shook as he breathed in heavy pants, his fingers slowly loosening from their hold on the stool to reach for the drought between them. His hands trembled fiercely, jerking forward and back as he struggled.

“This does not need to be so hard, Mr. Graves,” Grindelwald crooned kindly, victory close at hand. “If anything, I feel somewhat responsible. I should have given this to you right off the bat rather than allow you to feed into hope for as long as you have. But you never truly had a shot, my dear Director, not really. _Just give in_ and it’ll all be over. You won’t even be aware you lost.”

Graves’ dark eyes shot up to him, trying to analyze his words and figure out what the potion would do even as the Imperius Curse forced his hands to finally wind around the fat bulb of the bottle and pull it close. With shaking fingers, he popped the top with an audible hiss that caused a small fount of smoke to blow free of the bottle’s opening. And then Graves flinched.

To Grindelwald, the potion smelled of brighter days long gone. It induced echoes of familiar laughter and smiling eyes, before everything had gone so wrong. It smelled bitter, knowing how fragile it was - how broken. To Graves, it no doubt smelled of home and whatever upbringing he might have had.

“No,” Graves breathed, but it was too late. With a long and growing smile, Grindelwald watched as the man slowly, painfully raised the potion to his lips and – stopped, its glass lips pressed harshly to his own, but not tilted high enough to pour. He was breathing harshly through flared nostrils, eyes wild and watching Grindelwald – as if hoping this were all some show of power to put Graves in his place and that the bluff would soon be called.

The bottle rose minutely and Graves’ pupils dilated with fear.

“Here,” Grindelwald said with false kindness, fluttering three fingers at Graves, “Let me help you.”

And with that last bit of magic, Grindelwald rose the bottle high enough for the drought to pour into Graves’ mouth. When the man tried to simply hold it there without swallowing, Grindelwald pinched his fingers in the air and magically depressed Graves’ nostrils. It wasn’t long after that, that Graves finally swallowed – first a little, then over and over as Grindelwald’s compulsion finally overtook his control and forced the entire drought down his throat.

No sooner was it done that Grindelwald released him from the curse. The second his body was his own, Graves sprung from his stool and fell to all fours, hastily trying to shove two fingers down his own throat to induce vomiting. But it was too late.

With a visible jerk, Graves’ body flinched painfully as the potion took hold – and with a howl that would no doubt have had the neighbors calling for the police if not for Grindelwald’s many charms and wards upon the place – Graves screamed.

It was a painful brew, and Grindelwald had deliberately made it that way. It had been a potion he had brought originally as something he did not intend to use nor did he think he would realistically need. Originally, he had thought it would be fun, but that it would create more complications than it was worth. After all, children were much more fragile captives to care for and keep alive than adults.

But now, it was his only choice if he wanted to finally dampen Graves’ magic enough to contain the man.

With great satisfaction, Grindelwald stepped down from his perch and rounded the counter to watch as bones cracked and shrank, pulling in and in and in as Graves’ once formidable build quickly deteriorated before his very eyes. And all the while, Graves’ screamed – at first with the deep anguish of a man in pain; slowly into that of a teen; and finally younger and younger, until his howling turned into the pained crying of a small boy.

When it finally stopped, Grindelwald was left with a boy wizard of no more than four or five swaddled in the dirty garments Graves had been wearing throughout his captivity. He was as gaunt as he had been as an adult – ribs peeking through his skin where Graves’ shirt pooled from his shoulder. But the dark, angry eyes that Grindelwald had come to know had changed to large, frightened ones that blinked at him in confusion. The child’s lower lip trembled fiercely, and Grindelwald could not help but scowl when he realized that even as a babe, Graves was resisting crying in front of his captor – although the child likely did not recognize him as that at all; just as a stranger.

He did, however, seem far too frightened to speak. So Grindelwald spoke for him.

With a grand, sweeping gesture and a false smile upon his face, Grindelwald knelt before Graves and said, “Hello, young man. Are you lost?”

Graves stared at him, trembling, then nodded.

“It’s a scary thing, to be lost away from home,” Grindelwald said with a sympathetic nod, then held out a large hand to the boy. “I can help you. Won’t you come with me?”

And gently, Graves took his hand.


	2. A Hypocrite's Punishment

Percival Graves turned out to be a very well behaved child, Grindelwald found out. Unlike his older counterpart, young Graves listens to every word Grindelwald said. So when Grindelwald told him that his father, the great auror Gondulphus Graves, was on a mission and that he left Graves in his care to keep him safe; Graves believed him. When he told the boy that he had to stay in the small closet-turned-prison-turned-spare-bedroom because there were special wards on the room to keep him safe; he didn’t question it. When he told him he must be very quiet and very obedient, and follow Grindelwald’s every word; he did just that. When he showed the boy his disguise, lest it become an issue later; he accepted it without another thought. Grindelwald was his father’s friend, so therefore, his friend. Just like that.

Grindelwald could even leave the child alone in the flat, unsupervised except for occasionally peering through his various monitoring wards, and have nothing to fear.

All in all, Gondulphus Graves had raised a very quiet, very obedient, very serious young boy. No surprise there, considering the well-known demeanor of the cold, determined Auror that had died valiantly in the line of duty while Graves was but a teen – a memory he gleaned from an unwilling Graves during one of their more mundane but entertaining torture sessions. He had been a simple but just man that did not believe justice came in shades of grey. America and the safety of the wizarding world came first; a disposition that only increased when Mrs. Graves died. A view that became more like an obsession than a career. A disposition that must have been ingrained in the young Percival Graves who, unlike most children, conducted himself with the upmost care. A strange behavior to see in a child so young – stranger still to see the sheer, naked kindness in the boy's eyes that mere days ago had been so old and guarded and scathing.

All in all, things moved along smoothly once Percival Graves became a child. Smooth until the boy caught a cold, that was. Things got rather out of hand from there.

It began when Grindelwald came home one day to find the door to the boy’s closet blown clean off its hinges and quite obviously embedded in pieces in the wall. Eyebrows raised, he stepped over the wreckage – wand drawn, lest somehow Graves had returned to his rightful self – and sighed at what he saw inside the small hovel he had locked the boy away in.

He was huddled up tight on the bed. He had his scrawny, knobby knees tucked tight to his chest, and his arms wrapped around them to pull them that much tighter. Most of his face was obscured by those knees, but his eyes – oh, Grindelwald could see the large, frightened eyes that peeked out at him. Glimmering with tears unshed. Afraid. Guilty. Ashamed.

“I’m sorry,” Graves moaned on a whisper and sniffed. “I didn’t mean to.”

Grindelwald said nothing. Instead, he let his eyes travel slowly from the boy to the shards of door in the wall and back, eyebrows raised. He let out a soft, impressed noise and was halfway to the boy when suddenly, the small child sneezed – his whole body jerking with the effort – and Grindelwald had barely a moment to think, ‘ _Did he just sneeze into his own knees?’_ before the hem of his coat promptly caught fire.

Graves scrambled back into the corner where his bed met the wall, terrified.

It was a simple matter to dispel the small flame the boy had ignited, once Grindelwald was over the initial shock of having been set on fire by a kid. It was another matter altogether to calm said child.

“Percival,” he started, taking a step forward, but the boy had already curled in on himself even further – wracked with shivers so fierce Grindelwald thought he might shake apart.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” the boy cried; face tucked away, voice muffled and wet and soft. “Something’s wrong. I can’t fix it.”

“Fix it?” Grindelwald asked, surprised. He drew up to the bed and sat down a reasonable distance from the boy. “Fix what?”

“Me,” Graves said, looking at Grindelwald before his eyes darted to the corner of his singed coat. His lip trembled. “I’m broke.”

“Broken,” Grindelwald corrected him and frowned when he realized the domesticity of such a simple action. He made a note to keep an eye on that behavior. “And you’re not broken, Percival. You’re a wizard, like you’re father. Like me,” he said, then extended one large hand and lit a small, hovering flame within it. “See?”

At first, the boy flinched away. But after a small moment, Graves slowly unfurled from his tight, dreadful ball and leaned toward the heatless flame that Grindelwald had conjured.

“It’s different,” Graves said, his eyes glittering – but still obviously upset by something.

“Yes,” Grindelwald said with a nod, twirling his fingers to make the little flame dance, “That’s because it’s far more controlled.”

Graves sniffed; his tears from earlier thick on his dark, long lashes. He looked away.

“I’m sorry, I won’t do it again.”

Grindelwald blinked, unable to follow the child and secretly annoyed, knowing that he was stumped by this young version of his prisoner. “Why?”

Graves’ eyes shot up to him, as though surprised that he didn’t know.

“I’m not allowed to do that. N-not without father,” he swallowed dryly, then said, “Someone might see. Or get hurt.”

Someone. Or rather, a Muggle.

Grindelwald felt a fire light in his chest hearing those words. Another boy – obviously talented to be conjuring magic so strong at such a young age or even have his magic manifest at all – cowed and shamed for exploring the gifts that made him one of the elite of the human race. Grindelwald clenched his hand and with a bright flash, the fire in his palm flickered out, startling his young prisoner as the boy took note of the way Grindelwald’s hands had begun to shake.

And with a breath, Grindelwald soothed the rage from his hands and stood.

“You can hardly control that, what with your cold,” Grindelwald said as he walked to the doorway and cast a quick repairing spell upon the door. Graves watched with wide-eyed fascination as the shards of the door floated up into the air and slowly joined themselves back together before resting softly back onto their hinges – fixed and none the worse for wear. “Nor should you hide it…”

“Sir?” Graves asked, because the boy had yet to find a way to wrap his mouth around Grindelwald’s actual name.

“Nothing. A story for another night, perhaps,” Grindelwald said as he paused at the door before gesturing for the child to follow him. “Come now, Mr. Graves. Let’s get you fed and deal with that cold.”

And that’s how the world’s most dangerous wizard found himself suddenly a nursemaid to a small child of no more than three; one hand repairing the cupboard that next fell victim to Graves’ violent sneezing, the other idly compelling a spoon to stir the broth he had boiling on the stove.

That night Graves managed to turn all of the carpets purple, light one of the curtains on fire with much more force than he had with Grindelwald’s coat (which he found mildly disturbing now that he realized what _could_ have happened), knock all of the books off their shelves, burst the all but one of the light bulbs, and transfigure a paperweight into a pigeon – the removal of which had become a completely different adventure altogether.

Needless to say, Grindelwald did not sleep that night. And while each manifestation caused by the child's cold became increasingly more and more annoying, he also could not find it in himself to discourage the boy. After all, he was fighting for the freedom of his fellow witches and wizards from the very thinking the boy had obviously been taught already. Dark wizard he might be, but this boy was one of his kin. Young and ripe for molding – _and powerful_ , far more powerful than most wizards his age. To discourage him would mean becoming the very enemy Grindelwald hated.

So when Graves sneezed a new color onto his shoes that morning, he couldn’t find it in himself to shove the boy into his room and hope the child did not blow himself up. Instead, with a very _firm_ set of instruction for the boy, he did the only thing he could think of.

He introduced his "colleagues" to Percival Graves, his beloved nephew with whom his sister had named after him.

After all, he should hardly have to suffer caring for their young boss alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know how 3-year-old's talk. Please be gentle. Children are a mystery I do not understand.  
> I literally had to google "how much can children articulate at 3".  
> This is my life now.


End file.
